A rare glimpse into the town of "Devil's Paradise" where people die from hard work and pollution when they are only 30 years old

The mining town of La Rinconade in Peru is considered to be the tallest and most remote city in the world and is known as the "Paradise of the Devil" where people, literally, work to death.

City residents die at a young age due to harsh living conditions of frost and consumption of water contaminated with toxic mercury

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23/12/2021

Thursday, 23 December 2021, 23:50

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The life of the gold miners in La Rinconada, the highest settlement in the world (Reuters)

The mining town of La Rincunada in the Peruvian Andes is a hell on earth. The most remote city in the world is called the "Paradise of the Devil" because everyone who lives in it dies at a young age. The town is located at an altitude of 16,000 feet up a mountain - and it also holds the title of the highest city in the world. The locals - about 50,000 inhabitants - work in search of gold in the mines, with a life expectancy of 30 to 35 years. This is because of the harsh living conditions in the place - whether it is the frozen weather, garbage and filth collected in the city without evacuation and the drinking sources contaminated with toxic mercury used to clean the gold found in the mines.

Many of the city's residents suffer from lung diseases and respiratory infections that affect the nervous system and cause memory loss, deformities, paralysis and eventually death.

Now, residents of La Rinconda claim that the amount of gold in the area is also dwindling.

"It's not like it used to be. That's why so many bad things are happening here," one resident told the British Sun.

When police or other authorities come to town to try to enforce the law or restrict mining, they are threatened by miners who promise to use against them the dynamites they used to open the tunnels.

The women also join the demonstrations - and some say the men are forcing them.

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Live in filth

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"Now that there is less gold on the mountain, men drink and earn much more," said Eva Chura, one of the women who extracted the gold from the rubble. She added: "They spend more time in bars than at work." To extract gold from the rocks, men and women use mercury, a toxin that they wash in ice melted from glaciers. The water flows down the mountain into pools, puddles and rivers.

"The water used in mining is simply discarded and all downstream communities, which are only agricultural areas, get polluted water to support their livestock and crops," said Federico Chavari, an environmental crime prosecutor in the area, "the same water carries heavy metals directly to Lake Titicaca." Titicaca is the largest lake in South America, an essential source of drinking water and fish for the surrounding population. Waste from gold processing adds to the pollution by carpenters from surrounding cities and untreated sewage. In 2012, a German association, the World Wildlife Fund,Called it the most threatening lake in the world this year.

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The gold nuggets produced by the town's residents have made their way, at least in the past, to supply chains of companies, including phone manufacturers and jewelers.

In 2018 a Swiss refinery that used metal for years stopped it, after prosecutors in Peru claimed the company that collected it served as a front for organized crime.

Women are not allowed to enter the mines

Eva arrived 12 years ago from her hometown of Chupa in the area evacuated to La Rinconada.

5 out of 8 of her children live with her in her zinc house.

The debut is 13-year-old Natalie.

Eva is still breastfeeding the little one, a boy named Alizon, and taking the baby with her when she goes out in search of gold scraps.

It takes Eva an hour to get to the site where the women work.

When they get there, they sit down and chew on coca leaves, light two "saints" cigarettes and drink a little anise for good luck.

"Sometimes there is gold, sometimes there is not. There is very little at the moment," she said.

The men of the town prevent the women from entering the mines dug under the rock.

They say the female spirit of the mine, which lies beneath a glacier called "La Bella Dormianta," or "Sleeping Beauty," will be jealous and angry if women try to steal its wealth.

Instead, the working women take turns huddling on piles of black garbage that the men have dumped, standing and turning rocks, with their sharp eyes scanning the lumps for gold.

Everything promises they collect and take back to process and sell to black market traders whose stalls are located along the main street of La Rinconade.

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"In a week sometimes I manage to get one or two grams of gold," Eva said.

Black market prices vary, but in the London market it will reach $ 50 or $ 100.

"If I'm lucky, I can also sometimes collect 20 grams, but it depends on luck."

The quantities each woman collects are tiny, but thousands are searching - some estimates say there are more than 15,000 "gold sites" in Peru.

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Unlike gold, no one collects garbage in La Rinconada.

Women and men alike are risking their lives and subsisting in the frozen and polluted atmosphere of the mountain.

"Life is hard," Eva says, but prefers to keep working.

She added: "It is very sad to live with rubbish and dirt around you, to shower in the frost, with water from the mountain, but you force yourself to overcome it. The children give you strength and courage to keep working and living."

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